Watershed community management in Honduras

iDE technicians partner with communities and families to identify technology or environmental restoration projects that could improve the livelihoods of some of the 650,000 people living on less than $2 a day. With a focus on watershed community management, the Nuestra Cuenca Goascorán project is changing lives by addressing years of drought conditions with innovations in water storage, water application using drip irrigation, and awareness of soil conservation principles.

Why we’re here—

Honduras lies in the heart of Central America and is the top coffee producer of the region, with most of its population engaged in agriculture in rural areas. Rural farms are typically hillside plots that are vulnerable to erosion and difficult to cultivate due to increasing lack of access to water. Recently, incomes for this population have decreased dramatically due to damages to coffee plants from disease along with an overall decline in real agricultural prices, reflecting world market price trends.

Time to grow

For Amelia Martinez, she’s most proud of the solar pump on her farm. She no longer has to carry buckets of water from the nearby stream to irrigate her beans, corn, tomatoes and peppers. The solar pump pulls water from the stream and distributes it to drip irrigation tubes lining her plant beds. With this task off her hands, she spends her time growing other parts of the farm business, like the new chicken production.

What matters—

Gender Equity

Gender discrimination in Honduras stems from the cultural tradition of “machismo,” wherein men are expected to be authoritative and women to be subservient. In practice, this leads to a lack of opportunities and large pay deficits for women in the labor force.

By focusing on women as customers and entrepreneurs, iDE strengthens their participation in rural value chains and increases their access to technology, know-how, finance, and markets.

Nutrition

Chronic undernutrition in Honduras results from a diet high in basic grains without access to vegetables with high nutritious value. This results in high incidences of stunting among children.

By promoting crop diversification into high-value, nutritious foods, iDE empowers farmers to earn more income and provide their families and communities a more varied diet, fueling them with the energy and mental ability they need to be successful.

Food Security

Due to its geo-climatic location in Central America, Honduras is prone to severe droughts, hurricanes, and lingering effects from the El Niño weather pattern. This has a direct impact on agricultural activities and the ability of Honduran families to produce enough food.

By improving farmers’ access to high-quality seeds, technology, and farming best practices, iDE enhances their ability to increase production, growing their incomes and food availability in their communities, region, and country.

Resilience to Climate Change

Portions of Honduras are in the Corridor Seco ("dry corridor"), a region that often suffers extreme periods of drought, extending across Central America and including El Salvador, Guatemala, and Nicaragua. Conversely, it is also considered one of the most vulnerable countries to floods, which in the past have had disastrous effects, such as crop damage, soil erosion, and infrastructure disruptions.

iDE helps people in rural areas build their resilience to climate extremes through the use of water-saving and climate-smart agricultural technologies and practices.

Value chains in Latin America

Honduras is the leading producer and exporter of coffee in Central America. Doña Julia Rivera is a coffee farmer in Marcala—a region of Honduras known for its high-quality, organic, and sustainably produced coffee beans. Working with iDE, Doña Julia has been able to expand her farm business with the help of drip irrigation and farmer training. Her farm is now an example in her community.

What works—

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Agriculture

iDE’s approach in Honduras focuses on improving farmer livelihoods while promoting integrated water, forest, and soil conservation. We develop technologies and clean energy solutions for small-scale, rural farmers. Through training and outreach activities in collaboration with private and public partners, iDE promotes crop diversification in order to secure food supplies during the “thin months,” in conjunction with nutrition awareness to reduce malnutrition and stunting. As supply chains for new technologies are still nascent, iDE provides technical support for the solutions it develops by training local village mechanics to install, repair, and maintain these low-cost technologies.

Finance

With its partners, iDE is developing microfinance solutions for small farm owners through community-based savings and loans groups of 20 to 35 people known as cajas rurales or cajas de ahorro y crédito. With seed capital from donors, these credit facilities provide loans to members, with no collateral required, in order to finance drip irrigation kits, seeds, fertilizer, and other investments in their farm. Because the members know each other, they know who is able to repay the loans. These organizations enable the group to receive discounts for bulk purchases as well as benefit from a better negotiation position.

Doña Julia lives in a region of Honduras called Marcala, known for its high-quality coffee production. Undernourishment is a widespread problem among coffee farmers in this region. Normally, farmers only earn an income during the four months of coffee harvesting—leaving farmers eight months each year, known as the “thin months,” to survive on their coffee earnings.